LAHORE: The president, government and members of legislative assembly (MLAs) of Azad Jammu and Kashmir (AJK) should be carrying out lobbying instead of parliamentary envoys appointed by prime minister to highlight Indian brutalities in Indian-Held Kashmir and to lobby for the Kashmir cause in 10 countries of the world.
This was stated in a press release issued by PILDAT on Monday. According to the statement, PILDAT has maintained that it makes little sense that MPs of Pakistan go as envoys to ‘lobby for the Kashmir cause’, while the new legislative assembly of Azad Jammu and Kashmir has been sworn in since July this year.
With the appointment of Masood Khan as AJK president, it is much more effective that the new president, government and MLAs of AJK should highlight and lobby for the Kashmir cause. Utilising Pakistani MPs for this purpose could weaken and not strengthen the position of the country, it said.
There is little justification behind prime minister’s nomination of 20 parliamentarians as special envoys when there is already a ‘Special Committee on Kashmir’, PILDAT said in a statement.
“The current National Assembly’s Special Committee on Kashmir formed in 2013, has representation of eight major political parties of Pakistan and is supported by a 20-member secretariat in the National Assembly. The Committee Chairman MNA Maulana Fazlur Rehman was granted the status of a federal minister,” it said.
The stated objectives of the Kashmir Committee include monitoring of human rights violations and atrocities being committed by the Indian forces in Held Kashmir and to increase awareness within, as well as, outside the country regarding the Kashmir issue, it added.
The objectives of the Kashmir Committee further include mobilising world opinion in support of the right of self-determination to the people of Kashmir, as well as, the principle stand of Pakistan, PILDAT said.
“The parliamentary envoys could not be the best way forward; as the composition of the announced MPs reflects another interesting angle. At least 16 of the 20 envoys appointed by the prime minister belong to the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N), two from allied parties including JUI-F and PML-Z and other two remaining envoys come from PPP and PML-Q. Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaaf (PTI), which is the second largest party in the country, is totally absent from the list of envoys,” it added.
According to PILDAT, the provinces have not been equitably represented in the list of envoys. All except two envoys are from Punjab and only one envoy from KP and Sindh each.
Balochistan could not manage even a single seat among the group of special envoys, while Balochistan is also not represented in the multi-party Special Committee on Kashmir, it said.
